Category News

Leaders of seven of the 10 largest economies in the world united today in an ambitious agenda for the conservation of the planet, recognizing the critical role of nature in rebuilding the global economy in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic.

In a joint statement, the heads of state from the G7 nations agreed to conserve or protect at least 30% each of the land and ocean on Earth by 2030 to halt and reverse biodiversity loss. The communique also included support for conserving the biologically rich waters of the Antarctic Southern Ocean, tackling marine plastic pollution, addressing unsustainable and illegal activities negatively impacting nature, and mobilizing sustained financing to tackle climate change and biodiversity loss...

Marine biologists are investigating a mystery skin disease afflicting whitetip reef sharks in Malaysia, with some early reports suggesting rising sea temperatures could be to blame. Named for the distinctive white tips on their fins, whitetip reef sharks are typically found resting in schools around reefs in the day and are a popular attraction for divers. They become active at night to hunt for small fish and other animals.

Pictures of one of the sharks with what appeared to be spots and lesions on its head went viral on social media in April after being taken by an underwater photographer off Sabah state on Borneo island.

Soon after, divers at Sipadan island, a famed diving destination nearby, and a team of experts from the state’s university and government and conservation groups...

A gray whale has swum the longest distance ever recorded in a marine vertebrate—more than 16,700 miles—over halfway around the world. The male cetacean, spotted off Namibia in 2013, is the first gray whale ever recorded in the Southern Hemisphere. But it took several years of genetic research to confirm the whale originated in the North Pacific, according to a study published today in the journal Biology Letters.

There are two known populations of gray whales: eastern gray whales, whose numbers are stable, with around 20,500 individuals, and western gray whales, which are endangered, with an estimated 200 individualsleft in the wild, mostly due to decades of commercial whaling...

On the occasion of,  World Environment Day (June 5th, 2021), the Ministers of Tourism and Antiquities and Environment launched a marine conservation campaign in the Egyptian Red Sea; the first of its kind in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region as part of the ECO EGYPT campaign. 

This campaign is launched in partnership between the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities (MoTA) and the Ministry of Environment (MoE), with UNDP Egypt, GEF, the Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA), the Egyptian Hotel Association (EHA), and Chamber of Diving and Watersports (CDWS) our goal is to raise awareness about marine conservation in the Red Sea and highlight the importance of ecosystem protection and restoration. 

This campaign sheds light on the the most common touristic practices that wou...

New research shows that fully protected areas had 30% more fish species and 2.5 times more fish biomass compared with open areas. It is becoming increasingly clear that humankind must do more to protect our ocean. It generates about half of the planet’s oxygen, regulates our climate, and is home to 80% of all life on Earth. Yet, ocean health is critically threatened by human activities that are driving the collapse of fisheries, the loss of biodiversity, and the acidification of seawater.

There is a growing recognition among political leaders, Indigenous groups, communities, and scientists that governments and other regulatory bodies need to protect and conserve at least 30% of Earth’s coastal and marine areas by 2030 to secure and maintain a healthy ocean...

A new study from the University of Agder shows that animals are part of the natural carbon cycle process that absorbs greenhouse gas emissions.

“It is a good thing that carbon is trapped in the ocean, but less greenhouse gas emissions from humans is overall best for the climate,” says Angela Helen Martin. She is a Ph.D. Candidate in the Department of Natural Sciences at University of Agder (UiA).

Martin recently published a review article on how fishes and other animals affect greenhouse gases in the ocean. One of her conclusions is that there is a need to consider how animals affect carbon in order to design effective management of carbon in ocean habitats and of marine vertebrate populations.

“For example, if we only protect the plants that convert greenhouse gases to organic ...

It’s becoming more likely that a key global temperature limit will be reached in one of the next five years. A major study says by 2025 there’s a 40% chance of at least one year being 1.5C hotter than the pre-industrial level. That’s the lower of two temperature limits set by the Paris Agreement on climate change. The conclusion comes in a report published by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). The analysis is based on modelling by the UK Met Office and climate researchers in 10 countries including the US and China.

In the last decade, it was estimated that the chance of any one year reaching the 1.5C threshold was only 20%.

This new assessment puts that risk at 40%.

Leon Hermanson, a senior Met Office scientist, told BBC News that comparing projected temperatures with ...

Marine conservation charity Surfers Against Sewage believe the world only had 10 years to reverse the damage humans have inflicted on our planet. The organisation, based in St Agnes, has called on the UK government to ensure the ocean is at the centre of climate conversations at the 26th UN Climate Conference (COP26) which Britain will host in November in Glasgow.

The desperate call for the ocean and the environment to be the heart of the everything we do as a global human society comes as SAS’s latest Ocean and Climate Report highlights how the extent of the ocean and climate crisis has not gone largely unnoticed by the British public.

The survey revealed that people do not think enough is being done to tackle the climate crisis, as 99% of respondents agreed more action needs to...

In the field of marine conservation, a marine protected area (MPA) is an expanse of sea, ocean, estuaries, coastal waters, and in the United States, the U.S. Great Lakes, where fishing, mining, drilling, and other extractive human activity is restricted in an effort to protect the waters’ natural resources and marine life.

Deep-sea corals, for example, which can be up to 4,000 years old, can be damaged by fishing trawls that drag along the ocean floor, scooping up bottom-dwelling fish and crustaceans. By not allowing humans to deplete, disturb, or pollute waterways at will, MPAs discourage such damage to and disregard for sea life...

Sharks are as fascinating as they are endangered, and scientists have been sounding the alarm on the rate at which shark populations are declining. Sixteen out of 31 oceanic shark species are now critically endangered or endangered, a study published in the journal Nature found earlier this year. The number of oceanic sharks and rays in the world has declined by 71% from 1970 to 2018, the researchers observed.

Now, scientists have been able to use artificial insemination to bring 97 baby sharks to life, a new study published in Scientific Reports revealed, in what a release describes as the “largest-ever effort to artificially inseminate sharks.”

Artificial insemination of sharks could foster healthier populations in aquariums by encouraging genetic diversity, removing the need to t...